# Tension-Sensitive Drug Release System to Enhance Targeting Selectivity

> **NIH NIH R21** · JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY · 2020 · $609,641

## Abstract

PROJECT SUMMARY
 Many pathological cells generate and transmit higher forces, compared to normal cells,
in diseases including cancer, vascular dementia, chronic kidney disease, and hemiplagia. The
high forces facilitate efficient internalization of surface molecules bound to their binding
partners. We propose a tension-sensitive drug release system, where drug will be released from
an implanted drug repository only when high tension is generated by pathological cells, so that
the drug will only be ingested by pathological cells but not normal cells. As a result, only
diseased cells will be killed by the drug. Because adverse effects of the current therapies mostly
arise from the insufficient selectivity in terms of cell killing, will lead to enhanced treatment
efficacy while reducing the adverse effects, thereby improving both survival rates and the quality
of life for patients. Overall, our drug release system will be the first of its kind to selectively
target abnormal cells based on the stronger force generated by the hyper-contractile diseased
cells.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 9957316
- **Project number:** 1R21EB029677-01
- **Recipient organization:** JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY
- **Principal Investigator:** Yun Chen
- **Activity code:** R21 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2020
- **Award amount:** $609,641
- **Award type:** 1
- **Project period:** 2020-09-07 → 2024-08-31

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/9957316

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 9957316, Tension-Sensitive Drug Release System to Enhance Targeting Selectivity (1R21EB029677-01). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-25 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/9957316. Licensed CC0.

---

*[NIH grants dataset](/datasets/nih-grants) · CC0 1.0*